


2005

by heartstreak_04



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Crack Treated Seriously, Forgive Me, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Mutual Pining, This is just crack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-25
Updated: 2020-11-25
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:49:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27710951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartstreak_04/pseuds/heartstreak_04
Summary: Sakusa introduces Atsumu to the Sakuatsu tag on Ao3. Naturally, Atsumu is intrigued.
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Comments: 26
Kudos: 392
Collections: sakuatsu lol screaming





	2005

"We have a tag," Sakusa says out-of-the-blue one day, meekly, post-practice. They’re alone in the locker room, the rest of the Jackals having taken their departure after an exhausting match. 

  
"Ah huh?" A freshly showered Atsumu replies intelligently through the fabric of his shirt. 

  
"A tag on Ao3. People write about us." 

  
Atsumu has no idea what the hell Ao3 is, but the statement is surprising, if not intriguing. Sakusa watches him as he pops his shaggy mop of wet hair out of his t-shirt, and beckons him to see. 

  
_ 1-20 of 1753 Works in Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi _

  
"Hot damn! That's a lot of hate mail." 

  
"Not everything is hateful. Most of it is fanfiction. Well-written pieces… about us. In a romantic relationship." Atsumu takes note of the flush on Sakusa's face, as he pulls up the latest work, and points to a few implicative sentences. _Oh my._

  
Atsumu splutters, internally! he has his composure under control, thank you very much. But his heart does quiver at the idea of fans taking their time to type out impossible situations, dedicated to him and Sakusa.

  
He takes the phone from Sakusa ("Are your hands dry?" "Yeah, don't worry.") and reads through the work he's been shown. It's not 100% accurate to their personalities for the sake of creative exaggeration, but the love from both fans and their fictional selves does shine through.

  
_Why is Sakusa reading about them in a romantic context?_

  
"That's real interestin' Omi-Omi." He lies. This will _definitely_ be his next obsession. "But I'll be honest. Never took ya as one to engage with fans."

  
Sakusa becomes oddly defensive, "I dunno, why do you reply to negative comments about your looks on twitter? It's about knowing." 

  
"Hey now, I do that to prove a point: I don't care about what people say to me online. That's why replying to the hate will definitely chase them away!" 

  
Sakusa's signature expression of judgement forms on his (pretty, gorgeous, breathtaking) visage, “That’s a really stupid method.”

“Pssh, don’t gotta be so harsh now.” Atsumu turns away under the guise of getting fully clothed. He pulls on his loose pair of pants as Sakusa stares unabashedly. The awkward silence ensues. "...Are we still going for dinner?" 

  
"No," His now former pseudo-date partner ominously replies. "I've got things to do tonight." 

  
He dares to suspect that the fanfiction and Sakusa's sudden lack of free time are related variables. However, for once he keeps his silence and nods, "I'll text ya later then, Omi-kun!" beams at him, and waves him off.

  
It seems like he'll be occupied too, for a while. 

  
______

  
Once he crashes into his apartment, he showers again, and rushes to the laptop Sakusa gifted him for his last birthday. He nearly forgets his login details, suddenly feeling guilty for not using it as often. Sakusa already told him that he didn't mind. 

  
Ah, being a pro athlete does limit your usage of technology to watching sports clips, and most of his viewing was done with the team anyways. (Or, at Sakusa’s apartment. Atsumu’s not the one with the television.)

  
He searches for the website again. Was it called A03? He finds it (Thank you Kevin Gibbs for suggested searches), and it’s easily the top result. Archive Of Our Own, he clicks through a few of the top tags curiously. 

  
He's no stranger to the concept of fanfiction, but actually reading through a few summaries changes his negative feelings towards it. Maybe it was bred out of stereotype. Most of the works are positive, if not joyful, portraying the alternate realities where everything worked out for the couple in the end. It's horrendously unrealistic, but still heartwarming. Atsumu knows Sakusa was always more of a realist, so it surprises him to learn of the possibility that these are the kind of websites he frequents. 

  
Writing for the sake of catharsis, rather than objective. 

  
Atsumu thinks back to the boredom of highschool literature, having to churn out essays for a grade he didn't care much about. Sure, his writing was pretty good (seriously speaking here), but he’d put more thought into what he would have for his next meal than any of those pieces. This was different, people pouring their feelings into what they wrote and loving it enough to share it with others whom they've never met. Suddenly, he finds himself appreciative of fandom culture.

  
Back to business. Confidently, he types in their names into the search bar, scrolling through the tag. It's been updated, the number of works increasing to 1756. _Hasn't it only been a few hours? Fandoms are terrifying._

  
Atsumu decides to read the work he was shown earlier in full to sate his curiosity. It's well plotted, with structure rivalling that of a professional work of literature (not that he’s read many, but he could tell). He enjoys reading how ‘Atsumu’ and ‘Kiyoomi’ get together after a match, by **Mikomi_96**. _Cute._ He leaves a Kudos on it, not knowing fully what it means. Although it is rather short, he doesn't have to worry as he easily finds a work that is twice as long. 

  
He reads through the 3 chapters, an angstier work, detailing the struggles of their relationship. _I would never cheat on anybody!_ Atsumu thinks, insulted. But he clicks on the continuation that's unfinished, marking it for later. He finds another work and cruises through it. And then the next one on the page. And another. Soon enough he's read through half of the first page of results. Atsumu, naturally, becomes hungry for more. Descriptions of them falling into a relationship is… far more interesting than he ever thought it would be. 

  
He isn't going to deny that reading about himself and Kiyoomi is addicting. More than platonic situations of them being close enough to touch was already bad enough to conjure with his imagination, but it's as if their fanbase takes it to another level, weaving narratives based on the little they've revealed about the nature of their partnership to the public. (Nothing more than friends. Really.) 

  
He panics. It's not like they spend a lot of time together on screen or interview, yet around 1900 works (and many more comments on Twitter that he didn't focus on in search of the hate) seem to say the complete opposite. He doesn't know how to feel about that, but he reads on. Blame morbid curiosity. 

  
It's nearly 10pm when Atsumu's stomach growls pointedly. He hasn't made dinner, or texted Sakusa, one of their rituals. _Oh well,_ he gets up from his mattress. Atsumu has a suspicion he's rather busy, too, for the same reasons as him. _What type of fiction does he read about us? That's weird to think about._

  
____

  
For 2 months he religiously reads through the entirety of the Sakuatsu tag (a name that he's picked up from their fans), carefully tiptoeing around the dubious sounding works to find the golden ones. And there are _numerous_ great works. He reads at breakfast, before and after training, and even on the bus rides to their matches. Safe to say that it's become part of his routine. Bokuto, Hinata and even Meian have questioned his sudden addiction to his phone, which he waves off with an offhand remark about how he’s finally growing into becoming an academic. Osamu sees through his shit and doesn't let him off easily, while Suna has revealed himself to be an avid stalker of the tag as well. "Fictional Atsumu is smarter than the real one," He tells him. Atsumu blocks his number for the 45th time.

  
(Atsumu wonders why it's Sakuatsu and not Omiatsu, or Atsuomi? Surely the fans have picked up on his nickname for his spiker. Those would be far better as ship names, but he finds that he’s biased. He decides that he will have the sole privilege of calling Sakusa by his first name, and gets over it.)

  
Sakusa seems to have joined him in his discovery of their ( _their!!!_ ) little fanbase. Weirdly enough, the embarrassment of reading about themselves online has long faded. Is it unhealthy to read about romance starring yourself and your opposite hitter? Maybe. But it certainly hasn't affected their friendship or playstyle on the court, Atsumu likes to convince himself. He swears it's all lighthearted and fun. Just two _good_ friends enjoying literary works of fiction. About them in a relationship. _Huh._

  
Definitely not how he imagined fan engagement. 

  
Shamefulness aside, the sheer amount of reading he's done in the half month is probably more than he’s ever done for educational purposes. Atsumu is promptly impressed with himself and he adds this tidbit into his mental list of skills he can advertise at a party.

  
3 weeks in, he had decided to create an account for himself. User **Tsumuton** has left kudos on more than 200 works, and bookmarked at least 50. He also has the Sakuatsu tag on his favourites, alongside the Kagehina and Bokuaka one. He's been venturing out to other ships as well. _At least those fanbases have more content to work with,_ he thinks bittersweetly. Why did he care so much? Maybe he was really a sucker for the romance genre. 

  
Sakusa has made no mention of his own account. In fact, he has yet to follow up on Atsumu's inquiry from that time he crashed the night at his apartment, of why he showed him the tag in the first place. He had used his infamous skills of avoidance and diverted the topic of conversation to chickens. Weird, but Atsumu still went with it. 

  
He chalks it up to interest, Sakusa liked to talk about more niche topics when it was just the two of them. That’s just how their friendship functioned. Atsumu talks about one thing and he gets either teased for it or a genuine remark, and vice versa. It's nice, comfotable. Atsumu wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.

  
He remembers that Sakusa has quietly read through his texts as he relays the story he's been reading for each respective night, interjecting with _lol_ or _thats fucked up_ when Atsumu details the misunderstanding and sheer _yearning_ in the majority of these. It's become an inside joke for the both if them to laugh about how their fictional alter egos are so horribly stupid and gay, not that fiction was representational of reality. 

  
But today was different. In their dinner outing, Sakusa proved his interest by how he understood the plotline that Atsumu was rambling about _perfectly_ , memorised it even. A fic by the user **Mikomi_96** again, about an AU where the both of them are part of the mafia. Oddly enough, it seems that Sakusa knows this author well. Maybe he’d read their fics in his spare time when Atsumu wasn’t looking.

  
He jumps onto the couch and whips out his phone, refreshing the page for the umpteenth time. The tag sits comfortably at 1986 works, its exponential growth still largely a mystery to him. _Were they that compatible in the eyes of fans?_ The thought makes Atsumu feel inexplicably warm. 

  
Atsumu's searched their tag on Twitter as well, being greeted with amazing fanart and an oversaturation of speculation and blurry photos of them being edited together (that was both terrifying and incredible). Not to forget the many threadfics he's read. _Why_ were _their fans so desperate?_ Believe it or not, he's starting to share the sentiment.

  
Reading about him and Kiyoomi happily together in a relationship is feeding his imagination with a number of dangerous thoughts. _Secret meetings after practice, going on dinner dates, staying over at each other's apartments overnight…_

  
"Wow," Atsumu, awed by realisation, says outloud. "We already do those things." 

  
His mind then thinks back to the most recent fic he read on the way home, a short fluffy piece of them going on their 3rd anniversary date. He recounts the characterisation as being awfully accurate, playful banter mixed with the occasional insult, but deep seated affection throughout. And...

  
_Holding hands? Hugging?? Kissing passionately under the stars???_

  
_Getting MARRIED?!_

  
Atsumu feels dizzy. This isn't good for his emotional health, he thinks. He gets up and starts pacing. A buzz sounds from his phone, but he ignores it, too engrossed in the apparent realisation of the depth of his feelings. Does he want to have the things he's read from the fanfiction? 

  
_What does this mean? What does it all mean? Help me._

  
And then, _SAKUSA KIYOOMI YOU ARE THE LITERAL WORST._

  
His phone spites him out of his little frenzy as his ringtone blares out a happy nintendo chiptune, and he swipes it up to silence it. "WHAT." 

  
Sakusa ignores the lack of a polite greeting, used to it by now. "Miya. I have a proposition for you." 

____

  
For some reason, Sakusa thought it would be hilarious if they both raced to post the 2000th fic in their tag. Atsumu thinks it’s pure evil, sadistic and all around mean. 

  
_Oh Atsumu, you’ve known this for a while, haven’t you?_

  
Of course he accepted the challenge. Fuck Sakusa and his pretty face and wits, he’s always known how to spark the competitive flame in him. Now Atsumu has to write about their (non-existent) relationship and make it coherent, all while coming to terms with years worth of yearning that he’s only learnt about the existence of tonight. 

  
The blank white of the document stares at him mockingly. He decides on a confession letter type of fic, because Atsumu is a huge sappy motherfucker at heart, and needs some sort of outlet for all of this _damn_ love that he has stored for Sakusa. _Kiyoomi,_ he begins.

_Stupid Sakusa,_ Atsumu thinks. He describes his moles with the prose of an inexperienced but enthusiastic writer. He continues on with the description of his flexible wrists, moving on to his awfully built physique. _What the fuck am I doing, typing out my affections in Arial font size 11?_ Atsumu concludes that he’s officially lost it, which is hilariously late in his life. 

  
_Oh my god. I love Sakusa Kiyoomi. I want to be with him romantically, like in the fanfiction I’ve read about us. What sane person does that?_

Resolutely, he steels himself. _Screw the fanfiction. I want to prove all of the fans wrong. Who knows what type of relationship we’d even have besides us when we figure it out?_

  
It takes him 3 hours to finish.

  
____

Last sentence. He's actually done it. He wrote a whole literary piece about his feelings for his teammate, crush, best friend and everything in between. He reads through the words of pure, unadulterated sap and cringes at the last paragraph. _This totally reads like a love confession._ Well. Mission accomplished.

  
Atsumu places his (enormous, gigantic, interstellar) sense of ego at the forefront of his mind and realises that he has the hurry and post it before Sakusa, or some dedicated fan claims the 2000th spot.

  
Atsumu characteristically stumbles onto Ao3, his steady setter hands shaking with the excitement of sharing a work, especially one so meaningful to him. Have his priorities changed as he was writing? Currently, Atsumu has yet to decide whether to share it with his muse, but decides that a bunch of strangers online will probably be more open to his feelings than his Omi-Omi ever would. _Would he be so opposed to it?_

  
Then again, Sakusa knows his account handle already. He should mark this as a huge joke in the author’s note, just to be safe. _Coward!_

  
_Wait. What was Sakusa’s account called?_

He’ll have to think about it later as the page updates after what feels like years. Nonetheless, the number of works updates to a nice, neat number of 2005. 

  
2005.

  
2005...! He missed the slot! And not by one or two… How did he miss it already?

  
Atsumu stares at the number, and then scrolls down to find the 2000th post. A chicken au fic, where the both of them are chickens… for some reason. _Fandoms are terrifying._ “What the fuck?” he remarks out loud. 

  
The user, a familiar name, **Mikomi_96** , wrote in the summary:

_I win, Atsumu. Enjoy._

  
Atsumu jabs his elbow into his desk as he buries his face in his hands. Sakusa’s been writing about them all this time! 

  
_What the fuck does this mean…_

  
He reads the fic. Apparently, Sakusa believes that Tsumuchicken and Omichicken have a better love life than they do. It’s kind of depressing how he’s jealous of a pair of avian creatures.

  
After debating whether to kill or kiss him when he sees Sakusa at next week’s practice, he posts his own fic (cause what the fuck, the world might as well be ending for Atsumu) and attempts to shut out any thought of Sakusa as he hides under the duvet. How is he supposed to sleep at night knowing that Sakusa actively writes fanfiction about them? And why did he have to find out because of a pair of fictional chickens? 

  
Is this why Sakusa showed him their tag 2 weeks ago? Is this his way of confessing? Atsumu can’t wipe the bashful grin from his face, no matter how hard he tries. He must be as red as a tomato right now. Oh. But he’s still angry. Furious. To prove it, he calls up Sakusa so he can berate him and also gush about how much he’d love to be his boyfriend. 

  
He picks up. Atsumu lovingly starts with, “You are the absolute worst.” 

  
Sakusa, the bastard that he is, has the audacity to cackle. “Did you enjoy it?”

“No.” Atsumu found it horribly endearing. “Worst thing I’ve ever read.” He giggles into a pillow, not unlike a teenager. “Why’d ya never tell me that you were writing fanfiction of us?” 

  
“I didn’t deny it.” 

  
Atsumu lets out a belly laugh, “Awww, Omi-Omi, you don’t have to be shy about it! Haven’t we read half of the fanfiction out there together? How many have I read of yours?” 

  
Another huff on the end of the line. “Go check yourself, I only have one account.” Atsumu can imagine Sakusa’s expression, that particular uptick of his mouth when he’s flustered but also delighted. “How about you? I read your first ever fanfiction.”

“The whole thing?”

“Yes.”

“Even the part about your pretty eyes?”

“Atsumu, it was 500 words. Of course I read everything.” There’s a double meaning in his words that Atsumu will probably think about for the next few years. 

  
Okay then. If this is how their story is written, then he might as well go with it. He curses the imaginary author of his life up above for writing it so ridiculously, and connects the final piece for them.

“Wanna go on a date, Kiyoomi?”

____

  
When they meet up for lunch on a Saturday, Kiyoomi uncharacteristically suggests fried chicken. Atsumu, unable to look at birds the same way ever again, violently protests and suggests their favourite ramen stand instead. “Why’re you so obsessed with chickens lately?” 

  
“They’re loud like you.” He answers easily. Atsumu giggles and kisses his boyfriend on the cheek, deciding not to take that to heart. He’s also realised that Kiyoomi is a huge sap just like him. Truly meant to be, they were. Maybe that’s what spurred thousands of fans to write their romance into existence.

In the coming months, their tag grows to surpass more than 3000 works accelerated by their increasing openness with their not-so-platonic relationship. They wordlessly agree to slow down on the fanfiction, because nothing compares to the real thing, as cheesy of a line that is.

Atsumu supposes he should take up writing as a hobby for other, non-volleyball related subjects. He’ll get Kiyoomi to be his editor. 

**Author's Note:**

> Alright. This was my first ever fic that i wrote in 9 hours. I just wanted to claim the 2000th spot but I accepted my fate in the end. Oh well! When has Atsumu ever gotten the things he wants directly? 
> 
> Thank you for reading, you can find me on twt @omihe_artsu. I would like to thank yna and tiffy for starting the chicken skts arc, as well as regan, mikee and mgo for reading this mess before i posted it ^^
> 
> Edit: i missed the 2004th slot too so i changed accordingly. woops. Also i fixed the formatting issues 👍


End file.
